黑洞社区

People don鈥檛 need much of an excuse to dislike News International journalists at the moment. But Baroness Margaret Ford, chair of the Olympic Park Legacy Company, has more reason than most. Following a splash in Murdoch鈥檚 Sunday Times earlier this month, which alleged corruption over the selection of West Ham to occupy the Olympic Stadium, Ford has done little else but spend time picking up the pieces. And all this has re-ignited the controversy over the battle royal between West Ham and Tottenham Hotspur for the ground, just when Ford had hoped it was over. 鈥淭he last two weeks have been crazy because all the things I was going to do have been put aside to deal with rubbish,鈥� she says, sounding annoyed afresh.

It鈥檚 not as if Ford doesn鈥檛 have lots else to do right now. The OPLC is gearing up for a series of key announcements and decisions over the autumn. Set up in 2009 to oversee the regeneration of the Olympic park after the Games, the body spent the first two years of its life re-working the 10,000-home 鈥渓egacy鈥� masterplan for the site, and in an interminable but ultimately successful 拢438m battle with the Treasury to get debt-free ownership of the park post Games. Now, one year before the 2012 Olympics itself, those battles are over. As well as overseeing the sale of land to developers, key new commissioning powers make the OPLC a body that contractors need to get to know. And quickly.

We really need to get going. We need to have everything in place the moment the paralympics is over

Margaret Ford, OPLC

So what is Ford鈥檚 next move? First, on the subject of the 鈥渟candal鈥�, Ford has little to say. The OPLC knew corporate services director Dionne Knight was in a relationship with Ian Tompkins, a director of West Ham who was masterminding the club鈥檚 Olympic stadium bid, so it based its decision-making team out of an office at its lawyers, Eversheds, in order to avoid allegations of a conflict of interest. What it didn鈥檛 know was that Knight also appears to have been undertaking paid consultancy work for West Ham, at the point the OPLC was supposed to be deciding between the club and its north London rival. 鈥淎ll I can say is that I expect and hope the investigation will show the process wasn鈥檛 contaminated, but we have to let it take its course.鈥�

Sunday Times expos茅s aside, for Baroness Ford work doesn鈥檛 get much better than running the OPLC. The former chair of regeneration quango English Partnerships describes the job as 鈥渦tterly irresistible鈥�. Highly respected in the regeneration world, the Glaswegian former journalist was made a Labour peer by John Prescott for her work at EP. Ford鈥檚 connections, along with a demeanour that, though friendly, conveys more than a little Glaswegian steel, mean she is not a woman to be crossed. Both aspects have been key to winning not just the site freehold, but also 拢291m of funding in the spending review, and, most recently, the power to commission the 拢315m transformation works after the Games.

The OPLC鈥檚 most immediate task is to appoint a delivery partner to oversee the building works needed to convert the park from Games-time to legacy mode, with 黑洞社区 last week tipping Mace to get the job. The work will involve reducing the amount of seating at permanent venues such as the aquatics centre, removing temporary venues, and slimming down the number of bridges and pedestrian routes to suit smaller flows of people. Winning the responsibility to commission this allows the OPLC to ensure it鈥檚 done exactly as it wants and, says Ford, deliver it more quickly and efficiently.

The delivery partner will have to hit the ground running - Ford says all of the main tier 1 contracts have to be let before Christmas. While some of the re-working of the venues will go to existing contractors, firms for the majority of the work have yet to be chosen. This doesn鈥檛 necessarily mean going back out to the market though. 鈥淲e will use existing frameworks where we can,鈥� Ford says, 鈥渂ecause we really need to get going. We need to get this procured and everything in place to be ready the moment the Paralympic Games is over.鈥�

In September the 8,000-home planning application for the site - to be called the legacy communities plan - will be submitted. It was Ford鈥檚 idea to review the plan to make more of its connection with sport and the prestige of the Olympics and to promote family housing, but it鈥檚 all taken 18 months longer than she thought it would. 鈥淚 was probably being optimistic. We spent the best part of 15 months making sure that the boroughs were on side, and that the Treasury accepted the shift to a family housing model. It was worth taking the time to get a masterplan that everyone loves.鈥�

Furthermore, all of the other venues have to have preferred post-Games operators selected before the end of the year, and a formal competition for the first major housing site - for 800 homes adjacent to the 2,800-home athlete鈥檚 village - will also be launched in September. Ford says the OPLC will hold on to its freehold ownership, expect developers to pay a uniform planning tariff, and may issue design guidelines. 鈥淲e鈥檒l come out with a development brief. If we have design guidelines they鈥檒l be made available. Then people will bid from a quality point of view and a financial point of view.鈥�

One bid that doesn鈥檛 seem to be getting very far is that by medical charity the Wellcome Trust. It has gone public with an ambitious 拢1bn regeneration plan for the whole of the Olympic park, including the athlete鈥檚 village, where it is understood to have lost out to a joint bid by Delancey and Qatari Diar. Ford won鈥檛 comment on the village - it is controlled by the Olympic Delivery Authority - but says OPLC won鈥檛 be evaluating Wellcome鈥檚 bid, and doesn鈥檛 seem to be weeping into her beer about it. 鈥淪ince they explicitly included the village, that aspect wasn鈥檛 something that we could consider as I had made it crystal clear to them that it wasn鈥檛 in our remit to do that. We did, of course, assess their proposal, but just on those aspects that come within our remit.鈥�

The 2012 Olympics were supposed to be the regeneration Olympics, leaving no white elephants. And while Ford says she is now more optimistic than before about the chances of getting a tenant for the giant broadcast centre, with four or five 鈥渟erious bids鈥�, she admits that some of the venues may not ultimately be economically viable. She also admits that, despite all the rhetoric, the ODA was limited in what it could do on this front. Former ODA chief executive David Higgins 鈥減ut a lot of effort into the legacy鈥�, she says, but adds, tellingly, 鈥渨here he鈥檚 been able to鈥�.

It鈥檚 here that Ford wants to direct her energies, rather than fighting the possibility of further legal challenges from Tottenham. 鈥淚鈥檓 excited about this whole regeneration project. But in the last two weeks I鈥檝e been getting excited for all the wrong reasons.鈥� Hopefully the next few months will allow her to return to the task in hand.